The Dallas Stars have insisted all year long that they have two starting goalies in Kari Lehtonen and Antti Niemi, and they rotated them as such throughout the regular season—so when they went to Niemi in Game 4 after starting Lehtonen in net for each of the first three games of the series, it wasn’t really a big deal.
"We have two goalies who both play, and we're used to that," Stars defenseman Johnny Oduya told the Dallas Morning News. "It really is just like any other game for us."
The result was a 3-2 win, and a 3-1 series lead going back to Dallas. Niemi faced 30 shots and made 28 saves in the victory.
"It's gone as good, even a lot better than I expected,” Ruff said of the platoon system in goal. "We stuck with it the whole year, and the reason I feel we finished on top at the end was because both guys played so well. I think if I had probably played one, we might not have gotten to where we wanted to go.”
